What is the Ohio Coordinating Center for ACT?

The Ohio Coordinating Center for ACT (OCCA) was created by the Ohio Department of Mental Health to promote ACT through training, consultation, data analysis, and advocacy, and is a resource for current and future Ohio ACT teams and for Ohio communities who are interested in learning more about the ACT model. OCCA has three areas of responsibility:

• Training OCCA promotes ACT through statewide training and technical assistance to providers, funders, consumers, family members and other stakeholders. In 2006, OCCA:
  • Conducted 15 statewide trainings on ACT, training more than 400 professionals, advocates and funders in the administrative, development and –programmatic elements of ACT.
  • Worked on site providing more than fifty days of side by side consultation and training for eleven providers across Ohio (Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus, Greenfield, Dayton, Akron, Canton, Newark, and Wilmington.

OCCA conducts several statewide trainings throughout the year. Anyone interested in the training topics are welcome to attend. All training require pre-registration by going to http://register.healthfoundation.org/ and click “Health Foundation” and follow directions. If you have any problems registering, please call Diana Trapp at 513-458-6618 or 888-310-4904 ext. 6618.

For a copy of the registration brochure click here.

• Quality improvement through data analysis OCCA has responsibility to collect, and analyze for quality improvement, the outcomes and fidelity data of ACT programs across Ohio. In 2006, OCCA:
  • Developed and installed a web-based database for reporting and analyzing client level outcomes data for ACT teams "certified” by the Ohio Department of Mental Health.
  • Created, collected and began to analyze mental health and criminal justice recidivism outcomes for Forensic ACT Teams in Ohio.
• Advocacy OCCA engages in various forms of advocacy for evidence based practices, and in particular for the dissemination, practice and sustainability of ACT. OCCA works with all interested stakeholders in advocating for the dissemination, and practice of the evidence-based practice of assertive community treatment (ACT). In 2006, OCCA:
  • Served on policy boards and steering committees, including: The Ohio Supreme Court’s Advisory Committee for Mental Illness and the Courts, The Ohio Supported Employment Coordinating Center for Excellence Advisory Committee, The Ohio Department of Mental Health’s Outcomes Systems Quality Improvement Group, and The ACT Center of Indiana’s National Institute of Mental Health’s Advisory Board for Recovery Centered ACT.
  • Led quality improvement and policy development efforts within and for the Ohio Department of Mental Health, including: use of outcomes in treatment and planning, certification standards, Medicaid policy, transition aged youth policy, prison reentry, implementing recovery, and peer support..

Who will we work with?

Multiple stakeholders are critical to ACT teams: providers, consumers, family members, Community Mental Health Boards, Coordinating Centers of Excellence (CCOEs), policymakers, advocacy groups, and others. OCCA will work with all stakeholders to spread the word and implement the ACT evidence-based model throughout Ohio.

What support do we offer communities and ACT Teams?

• ACT curriculum and training
• Resource for explicit principles, guidelines, and implementation criteria for ACT
• Resource library including videotapes, training manuals, research articles, fact sheets, and referral sources for consultation
• Website, newsletters, and connection to a  monitored list serve to facilitate rapid exchange of information and ideas among stakeholders
• Consultations and technical assistance to ACT teams
• Central collection point for evaluation outcomes from ACT teams
• Networking across state agencies and advocacy groups
• Clinical, developmental and programmatic extemporize on forensically involved mental health populations

For more information call Jonas Thom: 513-458-6733 or jthom@ohioactcenter.org

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Assertive Community Treatment (ACT) is a service delivery model for providers to use in working with individuals who have, historically, experienced unsuccessful interventions by traditional mental health services. This ACT 101 PowerPoint describes some of the basic elements of this model.

ACT 101 Power Point Presentation

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As with all Evidence Based Practices, ACT has a specific tool which is used in gauging fidelity to the model itself. There have been several revisions and it continues to be evaluated and improved. In general, this Dartmouth Assertive Community Treatment Scale (DACTS) is a good tool to use in evaluating how close a team is to the academic ideal. The DACTS protocol describes the scoring and rationale for each item.

Click here for the document in .pdf

Click here for the document in word

Click here for DACTS Scale Excel Spread Sheet

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